We used the Commons Ballroom for our reception and chose it for all of the built in features- beautiful architecture, a wedding coordinator, on site catering and bartending, etc. Dawnell Johnson was so accommodating and helpful, easy to get in touch with. The food was delicious. The room is very beautiful and has striking architecture so it doesn't need a lot of extra decoration. Overall extremely good value!!

We had our wedding reception in the Commons Ballroom at the University of Northern Iowa, with cocktails in the beautiful loungs across the ball. The ballroom is big and versitile, with a good dance floor and lots of room for tables. It was easy to work with the staff about the room layout and pretty easy to get access to the room earlier in the day (for decoration). There were some silly rules (had to provide Pepsi products), but we found ways to make everything work just fine. This is a great affordable venue, with beautiful big windows and a classy, but not haughty feel to it.

The best part about our food was that so much of it was locally grown. The meal was delicious and the appetizers were fun and tasty. They were flexible with the bar service (open bar for wine and beer, cash bar for mixed drinks). We also had a strange request that they handled really well: we wanted wedding pies and not a wedding cake. So my family baked a few dozen pies and brought them to the venue. The caterers had a beautifully decorated table to highlight the pies and did a great job keeping them stocked as people walked past to get desert. They also had a person dedicated to scooping ice cream for the pies.